Books published by St. Martins Press-3pl

Full of vivid detail, this combat diary uncovers the real heroes of the Vietnam War, the behind-the-scenes Marine Corps pilots who helped our boys return home...then went back for more.Daring missions. Dangerous rescues. Deadly accuracy.Many pilots never made it out of 'Nam. This one did. Highly decorated Col. Bob Stoffey-- a Marine Corps pilot for over twenty-five years, who served multiple tours in Vietnam-- has seen and done it all. Cleared Hot! is his story-- a fast-paced, high-casualty flight into heart-stopping danger.Includes eight pages of heroic photographs!

Andrew Morton uncovers the true story of the biggest celebrity of our age. Everyone knows Tom Cruise---or at least what he wants us to know. We know that he overcame a difficult childhood to star in astonishing array of blockbusters: Top Gun, Rain Man, Born on the Fourth of July, A Few Good Men, Interview with the Vampire, Jerry Maguire, several Mission: Impossible movies, War of the Worlds, and more. We know he has taken artistic chances, too, and as a result has earned three Academy Award nominations and three Golden Globes, along with the respect of acting legends like Paul Newman and Dustin Hoffman. After that, the picture becomes a little less clear. We know that Tom is a Scientologist, but not necessarily what that means in his life. We know that, despite persistent rumors about his sexuality, he has been married to Mimi Rogers, Nicole Kidman, and Katie Holmes. But it was not until the spring of 2005, when he jumped on Oprah's couch to proclaim his love for Katie and denounced Brooke Shields for turning to the "Nazi science" of psychiatry, that we began to realize how much we didn't know about the charming, hardworking star. For two years, award-winning biographer Andrew Morton has been tirelessly seeking out everyone from former teachers and girlfriends to Scientology insiders to friends who have watched a once-bullied, "nothing special" outsider transform himself into an icon Forbes has called the most powerful celebrity in the world Here, with never-seen photos and never-heard revelations, is a riveting, sometimes shocking portrait of the real Tom Cruise---his work, his love life, his marriages, his religion---from a master at uncovering the true story behind the public face of celebrity.

Jon Winokur defines and classifies irony and contrasts it with coincidence and cynicism, and other oft-confused concepts that many think are ironic.He looks at the different forms irony can take, from an irony deficiency to visual irony to an understatement, using photographs and relateable examples from pop culture. * "Irony in Action" looks at irony in language, both verbal and visual, while "Bastions of Irony" and "Masters of Irony" look at institutions and individuals steeped in irony, though not always intentionally. PLUS:* The Annals of Irony looks at irony, and its lack thereof, throughout history. A delight for anyone with a smart, dark sense of humor.

A revised, more focused edition of the essential golf etiquette handbook.Filled with pictures, detailed diagrams and extensive definitions, this revised edition from Barbara Puett and Jim Apfelbaum is all a golfer will ever need to learn proper etiquette on the golf course.Tiger Wood's popularity has introduced golf to thousands. Very few, however know proper golf etiquette--which is essential to enjoying the game. The revised edition of the classic book is vital for amateur and experienced players in addressing golf's number one problem: slow play. The book Paul Harvey lauded as "The first and last word on how properly to behave on and off the golf course covers:*Proper attire*Playing through*Playing with Strangers*And much moreAll the latest advances are taken into account: satellite-based yardage systems, alternative spikes, and cell phones. Its handy size and useful photos and diagram make Golf Etiquette the perfect guide for on-the-fly tips and rules.

A New York Times Book Review Notable BookSince the 1960s, ideas developed during the civil rights movement have been astonishingly successful in the fight against overt discrimination. But can they combat the whole spectrum of social injustice---including conditions that aren't directly caused by bigotry? In Rights Gone Wrong, Richard Thompson Ford argues that extremists on both sides of the political divide have hijacked civil rights for personal advantage, diverting our attention from serious social injustices. Is equality really served by endless litigating and legislating against every grievance or slight? Brilliantly argued, shrewd, and lively, Rights Gone Wrong offers "a crisp analysis of the limits of our civil rights laws and a prescription for how to move beyond them" (Kirkus Reviews).

So reads the fine lettering on the back of the intricate, ornate Celtic brooch Lucy MacAlpin Trelaine has just inherited. Lucy, an independent twenty-nine-year-old orphan, has devoted a considerable amount of time and energy trying to unravel the mystery surrounding her past. Having contacted everyone in five hundred phone books whose name even vaguely resembled Trelaine or MacAlpin to no avail, all she knows is that her parents were killed in a car crash in western Massachusetts twenty-eight years ago. Her luck changes when she sees a newspaper ad from a law firm inquiring as to the whereabouts of one Lucy MacAlpin Trelaine. The ad leads her to an "inheritance," which is no more than the Celtic brooch stolen from her after the car crash so many years ago, but it does provide her with a fresh trail of clues to follow, clues that take her to New York City. To make ends meet while continuing her investigations, she takes a job with hyperactive business entrepreneur Tak Wing, owner of the Neat 'n' Tidy chain of funeral parlors. Determined to help Lucy find her true identity, Tak Wing insists that they travel to the Scottish Hebrides, with Lucy disguised as a punk rocker. From kidnapping to grave-robbing to tea with the local laird, Lucy's adventures propel her toward a conclusion that may shake the British Empire to its foundations.

On April 20, 2010, the Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded, killing eleven workers and creating the largest oil spill in the history of U.S. offshore drilling. But this wasn't the first time British Petroleum and its cost-cutting practices destroyed parts of the natural world. It also was not the first time that BP's negligence resulted in the loss of human life, ruined family businesses, or shattered dreams. From Alaska to Kansas to the Gulf, journalist Mike Magner has been tracking BP's reckless path for years, and in Poisoned Legacy he focuses, for the first time, on the human price of BP's rise to power.

Winner of the PWA Best First Private Eye NovelPolice officer Keith Gilman's provocative debut is a dark and atmospheric tale of an ex-cop from Philadelphia who must face old ghosts.Louis Kline, PI, is asked to track down the missing teenage daughter of an old friend. In doing so, he uncovers truths about the alleged suicide of his friend, a fellow officer with the Philadelphia Police Department. They shared accusations that ended both their careers, and a love for the same woman. As Louis further investigates, he comes to understand the tortured life of the girl he's trying to find, and some truths about himself.Keith Gilman knows how cops think and he pulls back the curtain on a disturbing vision of a decaying urban world, haunted by shadows of deceit and death. Father's Day, a novel of great psychological depth and stark visual imagery, is a terrifying exploration of what lies at the heart of our deepest fears.

Can the legendary trickster be out-tricked?All the young men had gathered in the village courtyard to hear the Chief''s pronouncement: Whoever guesses his daughter''s name will have her hand in marriage, inherit half his riches, and become the next Chief. No one outside the palace had ever heard the royal daughter''s name.In a stroke of luck Ananse the spider discovers the secret."I, Ananse the most wise . . . the most clever . . . I alone know the name of the Chief''s daughter! . . ."But clever Lizard has plans of his own.Pat Cumming''s lively retelling and vibrant illustrations capture all the mischief and humor of Ananse, one of the most popular characters of West African lore.

The Gilded Age bon vivant who became America's unlikeliest chief executive-and who presided over a sweeping reform of the system that nurtured himChester Alan Arthur never dreamed that one day he would be president of the United States. A successful lawyer, Arthur had been forced out as the head of the Custom House of the Port of New York in 1877 in a power struggle between the two wings of the Republican Party. He became such a celebrity that he was nominated for vice president in 1880-despite his never having run for office before.Elected alongside James A. Garfield, Arthur found his life transformed just four months into his term, when an assassin shot and killed Garfield, catapulting Arthur into the presidency. The assassin was a deranged man who thought he deserved a federal job through the increasingly corrupt "spoils system." To the surprise of many, Arthur, a longtime beneficiary of that system, saw that the time had come for reform. His opportunity came in the winter of 1882-83, when he pushed through the Pendleton Act, which created a professional civil service and set America on a course toward greater reforms in the decades to come.Chester Arthur may be largely forgotten today, but Zachary Karabell eloquently shows how this unexpected president-of whom so little was expected-rose to the occasion when fate placed him in the White House."By exploring the Gilded Age's parallels with our own divisive political scene, Karabell does an excellent job of cementing the volume's relevance for contemporary readers. " - Publishers Weekly

A bestselling historian and political commentator reconsiders McKinley's overshadowed legacyBy any serious measurement, bestselling historian Kevin Phillips argues, William McKinley was a major American president. It was during his administration that the United States made its diplomatic and military debut as a world power. McKinley was one of eight presidents who, either in the White House or on the battlefield, stood as principals in successful wars, and he was among the six or seven to take office in what became recognized as a major realignment of the U.S. party system. Phillips, author of Wealth and Democracy and The Cousins' War, has long been fascinated with McKinley in the context of how the GOP began each of its cycles of power. He argues that McKinley's lackluster ratings have been sustained not by unjust biographers but by years of criticism about his personality, indirect methodologies, middle-class demeanor, and tactical inability to inspire the American public. In this powerful and persuasive biography, Phillips musters convincing evidence that McKinley's desire to heal, renew prosperity, and reunite the country qualify him for promotion into the ranks of the best chief executives.

The ghost of a young soldier from the Civil War haunts a troubled teen."I sat up. The jagged trenches were only soft grassy depressions in the sunny battlefield park. I felt tears burn my eyes, the relief was so strong, and then the misery of losing the ghost hit me."Alexander has the ability to see ghosts. But it's been several years since his last encounter. When he reluctantly joins his father on a long trip away from home, a surprise awaits him. In the unfamiliar territory of North Carolina, Alexander is confronted by the ghost of a young soldier who lost his life in the Civil War. As an unusual friendship develops between the two, Alexander is drawn into a new reality where he comes face to face with the haunting past of his soldier friend. But can Alexander help this troubled ghost, and can he, finally, come to terms with his own disturbing past? With deftness and insight, Elaine Marie Alphin tells a gripping story that weaves the supernatural with the historical. Ghost story fans and Civil War buffs alike are in for a real treat.Ghost Soldier is a nominee for the 2002 Edgar Award for Best Juvenile Mystery.

The new girl in town meets a mysterious old-fashioned girl who can't seem to find her way home.The girl didn't say anything. Her face held no expression.Ariadne shivered. It was cool in the shade, and her hair was still wet."Hello," Ariadne said. No answer. "Um-I was just taking a walk. Is this your property?" Still nothing. She took a step toward the girl and stumbled on a fallen branch. She caught her balance and looked back at the tree, but no one was there. The girl had vanished.It's bad enough that Ariadne's family just moved to a tiny boring town in the middle of nowhere. But worst of all is that she's so far away from her best friend. The kids in Dobbin seem nice enough, but none of them really understands how lost and unhappy Ariadne feels.None, that is, but May Butler. She's an odd, quiet person who wears the strangest old-fashioned clothes and has a spooky habit of appearing and disappearing in the blink of an eye. Despite their differences, there is a bond between the two girls. May, too, knows what it's like to feel lost. Cold in Summer is a 2004 Bank Street - Best Children's Book of the Year.

For fans concerned about the future of horse racing, "a well-told cautionary tale about greed and willful inattention" (Kirkus)."An insider's stunning account of the corrupt practices that threaten both the horses and the game . . . an engrossing read." -Minneapolis Star-TribuneJim Squires was in trouble. He was in the horse business, an enterprise seemingly intent on committing suicide, led over the cliff by visionless leaders. A clannish group called "the Dinnies" had long refused to share power, as vast overproduction and unbridled greed created a subprime-like bubble in the market. Overpriced animals of dubious quality and drug-enhanced performance on the track were undermining the integrity of competition and ultimately the very breed itself. With its economic model broken, its tawdry sales practices under attack, and its public image in tatters, the sport was overdue for a reckoning. Headless Horsemen is Squires's critique of what is happening to the sport and the animals he loves, as he and a small group of unlikely heroes agitate for a return to fair dealing. For anyone who cares about the soul and survival of horse racing, this book is an impassioned call to arms.

A generous feat of biographical sleuthing by an acclaimed historian rescues one child victim of the Holocaust from oblivionWhen the German Remembrance Foundation established a prize to commemorate the million Jewish children murdered during the Holocaust, it was deliberately named after a victim about whom nothing was known except her age and the date of her deportation: Marion Samuel, an eleven-year-old girl killed in Auschwitz in 1943. Sixty years after her death, when Götz Aly received the award, he was moved to find out whatever he could about Marion's short life and restore this child to history.In what is as much a detective story as a historical reconstruction, Aly, praised for his "formidable research skills" (Christopher Browning), traces the Samuel family's agonizing decline from shop owners to forced laborers to deportees. Against all odds, Aly manages to recover expropriation records, family photographs, and even a trace of Marion's voice in the premonition she confided to a school friend: "People disappear," she said, "into the tunnel."A gripping account of a family caught in the tightening grip of persecution, Into the Tunnel is a powerful reminder that the millions of Nazi victims were also, each one, an individual life.

From New Yorker film critic Richard Brody, Everything Is Cinema: The Working Life of Jean-Luc Godard presents a "serious-minded and meticulously detailed . . . account of the lifelong artistic journey" of one of the most influential filmmakers of our age (The New York Times).When Jean-Luc Godard wed the ideals of filmmaking to the realities of autobiography and current events, he changed the nature of cinema. Unlike any earlier films, Godard's work shifts fluidly from fiction to documentary, from criticism to art. The man himself also projects shifting images-cultural hero, fierce loner, shrewd businessman. Hailed by filmmakers as a-if not the-key influence on cinema, Godard has entered the modern canon, a figure as mysterious as he is indispensable.In Everything Is Cinema, critic Richard Brody has amassed hundreds of interviews to demystify the elusive director and his work. Paying as much attention to Godard's technical inventions as to the political forces of the postwar world, Brody traces an arc from the director's early critical writing, through his popular success with Breathless, to the grand vision of his later years. He vividly depicts Godard's wealthy conservative family, his fluid politics, and his tumultuous dealings with women and fellow New Wave filmmakers.Everything Is Cinema confirms Godard's greatness and shows decisively that his films have left their mark on screens everywhere.

America's leading expert on democracy delivers the first insider's account of the U.S. occupation of Iraq-a sobering and critical assessment of America's effort to implant democracy In the fall of 2003, Stanford professor Larry Diamond received a call from Condoleezza Rice, asking if he would spend several months in Baghdad as an adviser to the American occupation authorities. Diamond had not been a supporter of the war in Iraq, but he felt that the task of building a viable democracy was a worthy goal now that Saddam Hussein's regime had been overthrown. He also thought he could do some good by putting his academic expertise to work in the real world. So in January 2004 he went to Iraq, and the next three months proved to be more of an education than he bargained for. Diamond found himself part of one of the most audacious undertakings of our time. In Squandered Victory he shows how the American effort to establish democracy in Iraq was hampered not only by insurgents and terrorists but also by a long chain of miscalculations, missed opportunities, and acts of ideological blindness that helped assure that the transition to independence would be neither peaceful nor entirely democratic. He brings us inside the Green Zone, into a world where ideals were often trumped by power politics and where U.S. officials routinely issued edicts that later had to be squared (at great cost) with Iraqi realities. His provocative and vivid account makes clear that Iraq-and by extension, the United States-will spend many years climbing its way out of the hole that was dug during the fourteen months of the American occupation.

In his pathbreaking Resource Wars, world security expert Michael Klare alerted us to the role of resources in conflicts in the post-cold-war world. Now, in Blood and Oil, he concentrates on a single precious commodity, petroleum, while issuing a warning to the United States-its most powerful, and most dependent, global consumer. Since September 11 and the commencement of the "war on terror," the world's attention has been focused on the relationship between U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East and the oceans of crude oil that lie beneath the region's soil. Klare traces oil's impact on international affairs since World War II, revealing its influence on the Truman, Eisenhower, Nixon, and Carter doctrines. He shows how America's own wells are drying up as our demand increases; by 2010 the United States will need to import 60 percent of its oil. And since most of this supply will have to come from chronically unstable, often violently anti-American zones-the Persian Gulf, the Caspian Sea, Latin America, and Africa-our dependency is bound to lead to recurrent military involvement. With clarity and urgency, Blood and Oil delineates the United States' predicament and cautions that it is time to change our energy policies, before we spend the next decades paying for oil with blood.

This is the story of a rare sort of American genius, who grew up in grinding poverty in Camden, Maine. Nothing could save the sensitive child but her talent for words, music, and drama, and an inexorable desire to be loved. When she was twenty, her poetry would make her famous; at thirty she would be loved by readers the world over.Edna St. Vincent Millay was widely considered to be the most seductive woman of her age. Few men could resist her, and many women also fell under her spell. From the publication of her first poems until the scandal over Fatal Interview twenty years later, gossip about the poet's liberated lifestyle prompted speculation about who might be the real subject of her verses.Using letters, diaries, and journals of the poet and her lovers that have only recently become available, Daniel Mark Epstein tells the astonishing story of the life, dedicated to art and love, that inspired the sublime lyrics of Edna St. Vincent Millay.

Forget fad diets -- here's a proven program based on good science and good sense.The 9 Truths About Weight Loss is the long-awaited antidote to the scores of diet fads that have failed for so many. In a program built on scientific research and practical experience, Daniel S. Kirschenbaum shows us:--how to consider weight loss as an athletic challenge--the importance of eating sensibly and tracking your food intake --how to overcome the inevitable emotional roadblocks Going beyond trendy quick fixes, The 9 Truths About Weight Loss provides a manageable program for the millions of Americans committed to controlling their weight.

From one of the architects of the new science of simplicity and complexity comes an explanation of the connections between nature at its most basic level and natural selection, archaeology, linguistics, child development, computers, and other complex adaptive systems. Nobel laureate Murray Gell-Mann offers a uniquely personal and unifying vision of the relationship between the fundamental laws of physics and the complexity and diversity of the natural world.

Sarah Johnson's Mount Vernon brilliantly restores the lives and contributions of African Americans to the legacy of Mount Vernon. Digging beneath the well-known stories of George Washington and the era of America's birth, Scott E. Casper recovers the remarkable history of Sarah Johnson, who spent more than fifty years at Mount Vernon, in slavery and after emancipation. Through her life and those of her family and friends, Casper provides not only an intimate picture of Mount Vernon during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries-years that are rarely part of its public story-but also a window into a community of people who played an essential part in creating and maintaining this American landmark.